Bardo of dying
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The 'painful' bardo of dying (Skt. mumūrṣāntarābhava; Wyl. 'chi kh gnad gcod kyi bar do) — one of the four or six bardos.
Teachings on the bardo of dying usually contain the instructions for phowa practice.
'Root Verse' for the Bardo of Dying by Padmasambhava
- ༈ ཀྱེ་མ་བདག་ལ་འཆི་ཁ་བར་དོ་འཆར་དུས་འདིར༔
- ཀུན་ལ་ཆགས་སེམས་ཞེན་འཛིན་སྤངས་བྱས་ལ༔
- གདམས་ངག་གསལ་བའི་ལམ་ལ་མ་གཡེང་འཇུག༔
- རང་རིག་སྐྱེ་མེད་ནམ་མཁའི་དབྱིངས་སུ་འཕང༔
- འདུས་བྱས་ཤ་ཁྲག་ལུས་དང་བྲལ་ལ་ཁད༔
- མི་རྟག་སྒྱུ་མ་ཡིན་པར་ཤེས་པར་བྱ༔
- Now when the bardo of dying dawns upon me,
- I will abandon all grasping, yearning, and attachment,
- Enter undistracted into clear awareness of the teaching,
- And eject my consciousness into the space of unborn rigpa;
- As I leave this compound body of flesh and blood
- I will know it to be a transitory illusion.
Alternative Translations
Further Reading
- Chögyam Trungpa, Transcending Madness: The Experience of the Six Bardos, The Collected Works of Chögyam Trungpa, Volume Six, Ch.6 'The Bardo of Death'.
- Dzogchen Ponlop, Mind Beyond Death (Ithaca: Snow Lion Publications, 2006), Ch.5 'Evaporating Reality: The Painful Bardo of Dying'.
- Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying, revised and updated edition (Harper San Francisco, 2002), Ch. 14-15.
- Tsele Natsok Rangdrol, Mirror of Mindfulness: The Cycle of the Four Bardos, translated by Erik Pema Kunsang (Boston & Shaftesbury: Shambhala, 1989), Ch.2 'The Painful Bardo of Dying'.
- Tulku Thondup, Enlightened Journey—Buddhist Practice as Daily Life, edited by Harold Talbott (Boston: Shambhala Publications, 1995), pages 55-62.